The Shot

The Shot was a basketball play that occurred during a 1989 playoff game between the Chicago Bulls and Cleveland Cavaliers of the National Basketball Association (NBA). It took place on May 7, 1989 at Richfield Coliseum in Richfield Township, Ohio, during the deciding Game 5 of the Eastern Conference First Round series between the Bulls and Cavaliers.[1] With the best-of-five series tied at two games apiece and the Cavaliers leading the game by one point with three seconds left, Bulls player Michael Jordan received an inbound pass and made a buzzer-beater shot to give the Bulls a 101–100 win and clinch a series victory. The play capped off a final minute in which there were six lead changes. Jordan finished the game with 44 points. The Shot is considered to be one of his greatest clutch moments, and the game itself is regarded as a classic.[1]

This series was a rematch of the previous season's Eastern Conference First Round series, which the Bulls won 3-2. However, in 1989, Cleveland swept all six regular-season games against Chicago, including a 90–84 victory in the final regular-season game in which they rested their four best players (Ron Harper, Mark Price, Brad Daugherty and Larry Nance). The Cavaliers were the third seed in the Eastern Conference and the Bulls were the sixth seed; this was a reversal of the previous year's playoff seeding, in which the Bulls were the third seed and the Cavaliers the sixth seed. Cleveland had a 57–25 regular season record, tied with the Los Angeles Lakers for the second-best record in the league behind the Detroit Pistons. Chicago's regular season record that year was 47–35 which, although it placed them fifth in their division, was good enough for the sixth playoff seed in the conference. Given both these factors, the Bulls' playoff victory was considered a major upset. In retrospect, The Shot symbolized the beginning of the ascent of the Jordan-led Chicago Bulls. It was the first of many game-winning shots that Jordan made in his playoff career; on Game 4 of the 1993 Eastern Conference Semifinals, Jordan made another series-winning buzzer-beater on the same end of the court in the same building, to give the Bulls their fourth playoff series win over the Cavaliers, this series being a four-game sweep.